Why selenium is vital to us all

by JANE CLARKE, You magazine, Mail on Sunday, December 8, 2002

I am usually extremely sceptical when news of the latest 'miracle' nutrient or food hits the headlines (you know the sort of thing: 'Broccoli prevents cancer!') because I know that it is a rare nutrient indeed that has the power to save lives.

That said, I must condemn the recent decision of the Medical Research Council (MRC) to stop funding what promised to be a highly significant nutritional breakthrough, namely Dr Margaret Rayman's research into the link between selenium deficiency and the incidence of cancer and heart disease.

Selenium has long been known as a powerful antioxidant that helps to protect us from developing heart disease and some cancers and delays the signs of premature ageing.

Working with vitamin E, it furthermore controls the body's production of prostaglandins, hormone-like substances whose actions have an important impact on growth, thyroid action, fertility and the health of the skin, also lowering the risk of miscarriage and alleviating the inflammation and pain of rheumatoid arthritis.

A recent US study has additionally shown that taking a daily selenium supplement of 200 micrograms is associated with a 50 per cent drop in deaths from cancer of the colon, prostate and lung.

The withdrawal of the MRC's funding from Dr Rayman's six-year, £6 million, alpha-rated project at the Centre of Nutrition and Food Safety at Surrey University has dismayed many scientists, including Professor Gordon McVie, director of Cancer Research UK, who, like me, believes that we have just lost our best chance of proving selenium's life-saving potential.

We mainly derive this mineral from plants and plant-eating animals, and such foods' selenium content is directly linked to the levels of selenium in the soil.

Because melting icecaps washed selenium from British soil ten thousand years ago, our nation's levels are low (those of the USA are, by contrast, high).

And although we know that the body probably needs in the region of 60 to 70 micrograms of selenium a day, the British diet is said to contain only roughly half this amount due to the poor selenium content of our fruits and vegetables (including organic produce).

In practice, this could mean either having brazil nuts and raisins as a mid-meal snack, sprinkling them over your cereal or making my muesli (see recipe below), or using tinned (dolphin-friendly) tuna in sandwiches, as well as varying your diet to include other sources of selenium, such as squid (delicious in risotto Nero), lemon sole, sardines and swordfish.

Be warned, however, that too much selenium is toxic, and that although it is widely thought that taking up to 1,000 micrograms a day is safe, the Department of Health's current recommendation is an upper limit of 440 micrograms per day (equating to approximately 30 grams of brazil nuts or a whopping 260 grams of mixed nuts and raisins).

It seems to me that many lives may be needlessly lost until science has another opportunity to prove that either taking a selenium supplement or enriching the selenium content of our soil, and therefore of our fruits and vegetables, by using selenium-rich fertilisers (as they do in Finland), can have a dramatic impact on our nation's health.

I therefore call on the MRC to have a change of heart or, failing that, beg another backer to come forward.

As a nutritionist, I'm waging a crusade to save lives, and it's time for nutrition to receive the funding that both it and the British public deserve!

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RECIPE: Brazil nut muesli

Serves 4

115g rolled jumbo oats

30g each of dried, organic apricots, prunes, apples and sultanas

2 tblsp chopped Madjul dates

1 tblsp chopped organic figs

2 tblsp chopped Brazil nuts

2 tblsp wheat germ

2 tblsp each of linseeds, sunflower, pumpkin seeds

Place the oats and seeds (apart from the linseeds) on a baking sheet and pop under a moderate grill to toast until slightly golden brown - you need to watch them carefully, so that they don't catch and burn. Remove and allow to cool.

Pop in a bowl and mix in the dates, figs, hazel nuts, wheat germ, other seeds and sultanas. Finely chop the remaining dried fruits and mix with the other dry ingredients.